Miles & Kilo is an action platformer developed by Mike Burns and Four Horses Limited. Miles & Kilo is a sequel to Kid Tripp which you can read my review of here. It’s a more recent release compared to the other games I’ve reviewed so far. I enjoyed Miles & Kilo my first time through, but do I share the same thoughts I did when giving it my first go? Well, here I am writing about it.

Miles & Kilo changes quite a bit of Kid Tripp’s formula. You can control two characters, the rocks you could throw are now fruits and in limited supply, and the game is a platformer not an auto-runner. Each character has a variety of differences. Miles can throw fruit, punch, surf in specific levels, as well as cling onto vines and most platforms. Kilo can lock onto enemies to do a homing-attack like move. He can even roll through specific blocks destroying them. Sadly though, he auto-runs through levels. Kilo is exclusive to only a few specific levels, something I’m not a big fan of; I’d rather be able to switch to him in any level.

Miles & Kilo’s level design suffers from the exact opposite issue Kid Tripp’s do, they are built for an auto-runner, though there is an auto-run option that you can turn on which implies the devs knew this was an issue. With the auto-run option off, some levels end up feeling really unenjoyable. It hinders the game and it’s potential quite a bit, which is something that feels kinda sad to see due to how good other sections of the game are. Miles & Kilo also introduces boss fights and a world map. Bosses are generally well designed and thought out, but I feel they suffer from trying to accommodate both the platformer and runner settings. Sadly, it feels like that’s an unavoidable casualty.

I feel gameplay heavily suffers because the auto-running option exists. In order to get S-ranks on some levels you have to be in platformer mode, however the levels are better suited for auto-running. Thanks to that, the game sacrifices its potential as both a platformer and a runner. Because of that, I don’t agree with the decision to add it in as an option at all, but it’s better to have a good game with no focus than a terrible game dead-set on an idea. Miles & Kilo seems to go for at least one uniform idea though, “Kid Tripp but better”, but that focus doesn’t work well. I believe in trying to be better than Kid Tripp, it ended up making itself worse. This is especially true with the hit detection. A lot of things I hit, and even things I missed really felt like I shouldn’t have. This especially causes issues on certain jumps later in the game.

The presentation is amazing, much better than Kid Tripp’s. The music is a lot more noticeable in game, something I appreciated since Kid Tripp felt like it didn’t have any music. Sound effects in Miles & Kilo never get grating, but they can get annoying after a bit. Overall, everything is improved from Kid Tripp as it’s fairly basic with games presentation. There are a lot of repeating tracks though, which could be a negative or a nice little throwback. Sprite quality all around is a lot better this time around as well. There’s more emphasis placed on shading, creating less blending of sprites in motion; I appreciated that as it was one of my huge gripes with the original.

Miles & Kilo is a bit longer than Kid Tripp. It took me fifty-three minutes to complete the story. After beating the story you unlock a Time Attack mode which will just about double your play-time. On top of those two modes, there are many achievements for you to collect. It’s something not everyone will be doing, but something well worth noting. Some are a lot harder to get than I would have thought too. Overall, you’ll get a good four to six hours out of Miles & Kilo and it has decent replayability. Each world is seven levels and now there are five worlds instead of the just four in Kid Tripp. It’s not a whole lot more, but I think it helps in the decision making process.

I don’t believe Miles & Kilo is better than Kid Tripp and don’t recommend Miles & Kilo over Kid Tripp. If you are a fan of Kid Tripp and are looking for something similar, there are better options as far as runners go, but Miles & Kilo certainly isn’t the worst option either. For people who are trying to decide between the two or fans of Kid Tripp, I’d say be a bit wary. It’s by no means a terrible game, but not a great one either. One major issue I had writing this review was “Do I give this game the seal?”. On its own merits, Miles & Kilo is an enjoyable romp that I enjoyed more than I disliked. As a sequel and continuation of Kid Tripp, it fails in various ways that I think made it a less quality product. Don’t be discouraged or turned away completely, as that’s not my intent, I just think you should look over a few videos or wait for a sale.